The present invention relates to a subjective optometric apparatus. More particularly, the invention relates to a subjective optometric apparatus in which optometry is conducted by presenting target charts for examining visual performance to an examinee and an examiner asks questions to the examinee related to how the presented target charts are perceived by the examinee.
Conventionally, there has been known a subjective optometric apparatus, such as the apparatus disclosed in Japanese patent publication No. 2002-143092 for example. JP2002-143092A discloses a subjective optometric apparatus including a target-presenting device, an optical element-arranging device, and a controller, and in which examination of the eyes of the examinee to be examined is performed according to examination programs. The target-presenting device shows charts including targets for examining the visual performance of the eyes to be examined, the optical element-arranging device arranges various optical elements for optically correcting the visual performance of the eyes to be examined between the target-presenting device and the eyes, and the controller controls the target-presenting device and the optical element-arranging device.
According to the disclosure of JP2002-143092A, the controller is generally structured of a manipulating section, a display, a mouse device and a memory. The manipulating section or the mouse is manipulated to select the target chart to be displayed on the target-presenting device and to control the optical elements to be arranged in the optical element-arranging device.
The display is structured of a liquid crystal display panel. The manipulating section is provided with selection switches or selection buttons for selecting the target chart to be displayed. The memory includes an external storage device such as a hard disk, in which the target charts corresponding to the selection switches are stored.
In the conventional subjective optometric apparatus, addition, alteration and deletion of the target charts to be displayed to the examinee can be easily done by utilizing software.
However, according to the conventional subjective optometric apparatus including JP2002-143092A, the selection switches for selecting the target charts are structured based on hardware. Accordingly, when target charts to be displayed to the examinee are to be added, selection switches for selecting the added target charts have to be added in a hardware-based manner. Hence, the number of selection switches increases in accordance with an increase in the target charts to be displayed to the examinee, which makes it difficult for the examiner to figure out on which part of the manipulating section the selection switch corresponding to the target chart to be displayed is disposed. Therefore, there has been a problem in the conventional subjective optometric apparatus including JP2002-143092A in that a prompt optometry process is disturbed. This problem also applies to a case in which a list of the selection switches or the target chart selection buttons is displayed on the liquid crystal display panel in a software-based manner.